J. Fernando Peña Appointed Director of LIU's Rare Books and Special Collections Concentration

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Brookville, N.Y. -- Long Island University’s Palmer School of Library and Information Science is pleased to announce the appointment of J. Fernando Peña as Director of its highly regarded program in Rare Books and Special Collections. Mr. Peña succeeds Dr. Deirdre C. Stam who directed the program for nine years and recently announced her retirement effective August 31, 2011.

Mr. Peña comes to the Palmer School from The Grolier Club in New York, the country’s oldest and largest society for bibliophiles and graphic arts enthusiasts where he has served as Librarian since 2001. While at the Grolier Club, Mr. Peña oversaw the library’s technical services operations, as well as assisting in collection development and exhibitions. He also led the library’s conservation efforts and supervised the selection, design and installation of its first online public access catalog.

Prior to joining the Grolier Club, Mr. Peña worked in archives and special collections at Rutgers University and Harvard University. He received his B.A. in Linguistics (with Distinction) from Stanford University; M.A. in Biblical Studies (with Honors) from the Graduate Theological Union, Berkeley, CA.; M.A. in Hebrew Bible and Semitic Philology from Harvard University; and M.L.S. in Library and Information Science from Rutgers University.

Mr. Peña is currently Treasurer and a Board member of the Center for Book Arts, New York, N.Y.; a Member‐at‐Large and Executive Committee member of the Rare Books and Manuscripts Section (RBMS), Association of College and Research Libraries, American Library Association; and Secretary of the American Printing History Association (APHA). In recent years he served as chair of the RBMS Diversity Committee and the RBMS Pre‐Conference Scholarship Committee, and he has been active in the RBMS Membership & Professional Development Committee, and Budget & Finance Committee.

The Palmer School is based on the C.W. Post Campus of Long Island University in Brookville, N.Y. and also offers programs in Manhattan, Westchester and Brentwood, N.Y. The School has a full-time faculty of eleven and offers a Master's in Library and Information Science, as well as a Ph.D. in Information Science. The Rare Book and Special Collections concentration, the largest such program in the nation, is centered at the School’s Manhattan site. The School has approximately 385 Master's students and 50 doctoral students.

Long Island University is in its ninth decade of providing access to the American dream through excellence in higher education. It is one of the largest and most comprehensive private universities in the country, offering 590 undergraduate, graduate and doctoral degree programs.